A Change of Direction and a Change of Heart

Oct 22, 2018 - We were driving down a road we use a few times a day and for some reason this time I had the smallest thought, as we passed house 3627, that we needed to stop and knock their door. We were in the HUGE van and it was a tiny road, so there was NO where for us to pull over. After driving about a mile, I thought my soul was going to eat itself from the inside out and so I flipped a U-turn, parked on a side road, and we walked about 10 minutes back to the house. To be honest, it was THE tiniest thought in my head, so I was just praying inside, "c'mon Heavenly Father, I'm trying here, please pull through." We knock and a father of four named Peter opens up, looks at our white shirts and ties, says, "I'm Greek Orthodox... and I'm NOT going to change," then proceeds to close the door. I just honestly said, "that's okay sir, we were just driving by and felt prompted to stop." He said back, "that's what they all say!" As he stepped back, I mentioned something about the Family History Center just down the street. Random, but he paused, opened the door back up and we talked about his love for genealogy for a bit. The conversation led to him sharing how he'd visited the Temple in Salt Lake City and he asked about The Book of Mormon. All it took was a few minutes of sincere listening for him to understand that it is a witness of Jesus Christ that was SAVED to come forth in THIS day to help us. He asked for a copy and for the first time in years for him, we prayed and his WHOLE countenance had changed, like a thirst for something he didn't know was there was beginning to be quenched. We walked away and I literally just looked up at the sky and thought, "HOLY COW... I'm a NINETEEN year old kid that God just gave a clear, quiet prompting to in order to help someone find what they've been searching for their WHOLE life..." When the tiny thought came 30 minutes before, I couldn't have imagined we'd park a half mile away, almost get the door jammed in our face, and witness a man's heart completely change simply by feeling that God KNOWS him. I KNOW with everything I have, that I'm a part of God's work.

~ Elder Stone